Rosy is a vertical SaaS platform that helps estate sale companies attract, retain, and grow their buyer base while optimizing operations and increasing revenue. We set out to modernize the estate industry for the digital economy.
Role
Cofounder, CPO
Company
Rosy
Date
2022-24
Challenging an archaic industry to think differently.
Cofounding Rosy pushed me far outside my comfort zone and taught me invaluable lessons. We started the company based on frustration with how inefficient and poorly run estate sales were, I saw an opportunity to use technology to improve the experience. After research and discovery, I partnered with my cofounder, Jared, to build the industry’s first vertical B2B SaaS platform for estate sale companies.
We went through the fundraising ringer, making it to the YC interview and pitching more than 20 well-known VCs. Each time, we heard the same feedback: the idea was strong, but the market was too small. That didn’t stop us. We bootstrapped our MVP and won our first customer.
THE PROBLEM
Estate sale companies are caught between outdated tools and rising buyer expectations. Without better technology, it’s increasingly difficult for them to compete and grow.
THE GOAL
Power estate sale companies to attract, retain, and grow their buyer base while optimizing operations and increasing revenue.
Create a convenient attendance process that attracts more buyers while capturing important data.
Give liquidators better marketing solutions to increases buyer loyalty and improve retention.
Develop an efficient inventory tracking system that optimizes pricing and allows for expanded revenue opportunities
20+ Customers
Estate businesses across 5 different states nationwide
30,000+ Shoppers
Processed through our signup. Avg. growth for businesses 10x MoM
18k Emails sent
Marketing emails sent directly to shoppers. Avg. sale attendance increased 15%.
HOW WE GOT THERE:
Gathering insights
Before diving into designs, we spent several weeks researching the industry. We conducted competitive analysis and user research with the goal of trying to better understand expectations and behaviors across the sales landscape. The insights shaped early iterations, which we tested with prospects.
Validating assumptions
We believe companies can attract more shoppers and, in theory, increase sales revenue by using a sales attendance process that is more convenient for shoppers and captures valuable (marketing) data.
If we can effectively capture shopper demographics, contact information, and shopping habits, we believe we can give sellers a better way to engage with shoppers and market sales, and inturn increase profits.
If we can support key steps within the lifecycle of a sale, then we can promote meaningful features that promote growth for us and the companies we support.
WHAT WE BUILT & WHY:
Sale attendance
We believed that a streamlined and transparent sales-attendance process would increase shopper attendance and allow companies to capture valuable shopper data for downstream opportunities.
Problem: The sales attendance process is frustrating for shoppers (and liquidators) due to archaic and inconsistent methods across the industry. Common sale attendance methods: In-person signup sheet (33%), Line formation (58%), Numbers we provide (30%), Other (7%).
Solution: We took certain aspects of the existing methods, and moved it to an online system. Shoppers can easily understand when sign-up opens, meaning the time the online attendance list opens, and they can add their info and get their entrance position from the convenience of their home. They show up as directed the following day and shop. Businesses grow their marketing lists, since we require shoppers to input some basic details to attend a sale.
Sale signup page — unique sale-specific sale signup (attendance) page for shoppers to get into a sale.
Sale ‘signup’ configuration
A simple wizard with default inputs and custom fields makes the sale setup process easy. Making adjustments to an existing sale signup is easy using the sale details page.
Shopper ‘signup’ flow
Mobile (responsive) signup flow. Shoppers looking to attend a liquidator’s sale are directed to the sign-up page (below). Input some basic details and receive their entry pass.
“I wish every sale did it this way.”
– Estate sale shopper (Tucson sale March 2023)
Storing valuable shopper data
Our unique but simple sales attendance process captures valuable shopper data and stores it in the company’s dashboard.
The shopper list allows for filtering across several parameters, helping companies better understand their shoppers, their interests, attendance patterns, etc..
Shopper profiles allow companies to see important details and buying habits for their shoppers.
“My shopper list IS my business. Rosy has grown my list from a few hundred to a few thousand in a fraction of time.”
— Sacramento based liquidator and Rosy customer
Email marketing
What good is the shopper list and associated data if companies can’t leverage it to increase attendance at future sales? So we built a proprietary email builder and delivery platform so companies could easily send personalized and targeted emails to their shoppers.
Problem: Existing solutions don’t give liquidators the ability to personalize emails to specific shoppers. The experience is fragmented across different platforms.
Solution: Because we own and maintain the sale details in addition to the shopper list we can trigger sale promo emails in a fraction of the time.
Reputation mgmt.
By owning the end-to-end sales signup experience, Rosy can help companies mitigate and even prevent negative reviews so they don’t affect their public reputation, while also promoting and increasing positive reviews.
Problem: Negative reviews often come from disgruntled shoppers, who publicly express their anger towards things like pricing or inventory. These reviews can be unfounded, false or misleading, but regardless it can hurt a companies public perception. Positive review are shared less frequently (over 50% less often).
Solution: We built an auto-generated email that lands in a shoppers inbox hours after the sale. This email politely asks shoppers to rate their experience at the sale. This does multiple things… It captures negative reviews (privately) by allowing people to vent. This information can be valuable to companies as it provides insights about their sales. It also promotes positive reviews and encourages the shopper to share those reviews on public platforms (Yelp, Google, Facebook).
Post sale review emails
We implemented a sale review request email that is automatically triggered 2 days after a sale. Because our attendance process captures important shopper information (ie email) we can send this email and collect valuable feedback from shoppers.
Easy to share review form
We made it easy for shoppers to provide feedback. We prioritized a star rating system that rates their overall experience, while allowing for “open” feedback at the shoppers discretion.
More (positive) public reviews
The feedback flow is “smart”, meaning that if a shopper leaves a positive review (4 or 5 stars), we prompt them to share that same review on a companies public channels. Shoppers won’t see this if a negative review is captured.
Reputation results
Positive reviews shared across public channels increased around 30% (avg.), while negative reviews decreased by over 90%.
Website builder
As we conducted sales calls and gathered leads, we noticed a trend across the industry: very few companies had functioning websites. And those who did suffer from a poor experience. Our research indicated that over 40% either didn’t have a website or had a broken URL. In an industry that earns business through trust, a business without a functioning website is bad business. We decided to unpack this further and talked to as many business owners as possible. Key insight: Companies without websites said they wanted one, but lacked the time and resources to manage a website.
We felt there was an opportunity to capture customers with this “add-on” feature. A light-weight website builder that essentially builds itself. Because businesses expressed the lack of time or resources as a barrier, we designed an experience that reduced the hurdles to having a complete, nice looking, and easy to use/manage website.
One-page design layout
For the first iteration, we built a simple but elegant one-page solution that met the needs of most businesses. Anchor links in the main navigation scrolled people to key sections.
Default content sections
We reviewed hundreds of company (liquidator) websites and noticed some patterns. In particular, we found that navigation and naming conventions rarely differed. So, to make the setup process easier, we created pre-assigned sections. Users can easily change the name, reorder the sections or turn-off unwanted sections.
Design panel - make it yours
We didn’t want users to overthink the design, so we created some basic guardrails. To start we provided a light and dark theme with a list of color options for both. The feedback on this control within the design was well recieved.
